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THE  INDEX  TRACTS. 


No.     15. 


The  Battle  of  Syracuse. 


TWO     ESSAYS 


I  Rev.  JAMES  FREEMAN  fcLARKE,  D.D. 


FRANCIS  ELLINGWOOD  ABBOT. 
/f^. 

[From  THE   INDEX  of  May  13th  and   20th,    1875.] 


BOSTON : 
THE    INDEX    ASSOCIATION. 

1875. 


,5^' 


On  a  Recent  Definition  of  Christianity. 


AN  ESSAY  BEAD  BBFOBE  A  PBIVATE  CLUB  IN  BOSTON, 
FEBEUABY  15,  1875. 


BY  REV.  JAMES  FREEMAN  CLARKE,  D.D. 


In  The  Index  for  Sept.  24, 1874,  is  the  following 
statement  by  the  editor,  Francis  E.  Abbot.  He 
declares : — 

"1.  That  the  true  definition  of  Christianity  is  the 
first  point  to  be  determined,  and  that  the  consensus 
of  all  organized  Christian  bodies,  more  particularly 
Orthodox  Christian  bodies,  ought  to  determine  it. 
That  is,  Christianity  should  be  conceded  to  be  what 
the  great  Christian  Church  as  a  whole  declares  it  to 
be, — the  conflicting  views  of  the  dissenting,  small 
minority  of  "heretics"  not  being  entitled,  on  any  just 
ground,  to  be  taken  as  the  definition  of  it. 

*'2.  That,  defined  by  this  consensus  of  the  Church, 
as  a  whole,  Christianity  rests  on  the  principle  of  Au- 
thority, and  consists  in  the  system  of  faith  and  prac- 
tice known  from  the  beginning  as  Orthodoxy. 

**3.  That,  notwithstanding  all  that  is  noble  and 
beautiful  in  it,  this  Christian  system  has  steadily  op- 
posed all  mental  and  spiritual  freedom  which  has  not 
first  submitted  to  its  own  authority ;  and  therefore, 
by  the  inherent  necessity  of  its  nature,  it  has  been 
one  continuous  crime  against  some  of  the  most  pre- 
cious rights  and  interests  of  mankind." 


iv)fe6460 


On  this  statement  I  propose  to  make  a  few 
criticisms. 

I.  OUGHT  OUB  FAITH   IN    CHRISTIANITY   TO   DEPEND 
ON   A  DEFINITION? 

Mr.  Abbot  says  that  the  first  point  to  be  deter- 
mined is  *'the  true  definition  of  Christianity."  He 
does  not  complete  his  sentence ;  but  we  may  assume 
that  he  means  that  this  is  the  first  point  to  be  de- 
termined in  order  to  decide  whether  or  not  we  shall 
take  sides  with  Christianity  or  against  it.  If  this  is 
his  meaning,  we  think  that  he  lays  altogether  too 
much  stress  on  the  value  of  a  definition.  There  are 
many  things  which  we  know  perfectly  well,  which 
we  find  it  hard  to  define.  It  is  difficult  to  define  the 
feudal  system,  but  we  know  very  well  what  it  was. 
We  also  can  determine,  without  much  difficulty, 
whether  the  influence  of  the  feudal  system  was,  on 
the  whole,  good  or  evil.  If  we  were  called  upon  to  de- 
cide whether  we  approved  the  feudal  system,  wheth- 
er we  would  support  it  or  oppose  it,  the  main  point 
to  be  settled  would  not  be  to  find  a  satisfactory  defi- 
nition. That  would  do  very  well  for  an  abstract 
student ;  but  in  order  to  answer  the  practical  ques- 
tion, "Shall  we  support  the  feudal  system,  or  oppose 
it?"  the  first  thing  to  be  determined  is  this,  "Is  this 
method  of  organizing  society  a  good  one  ?" 

In  like  manner  we  may  say  that  whether  we  can 
define  Christianity  or  not,  we  know  very  well  what 
it  is.  A  good  definition  may  be  a  very  good  thing  for 
speculative  purposes;  but  the  practical  question  in 
regard  to  Christianity  is  whether,  on  the  whole,  it  is 
useful  to  society,  or  pernicious.  If  we  believe  that 
the  influence  of  the  churches,  Catholic  and  Protes- 
tant, is  in  the  main  evil ;  that  they  tend  to  demoralize 
society;  to  confound  right  and  wrong;  to  make  men 
more  worldly,  sensual,  and  devilish— then  we  ought 
to  oppose  Christianity.  But  if  we  think  that  the 
churches,  on  the  whole,  tend  to  lift  up  society,  to  en- 
courage education,  to  help  benevolent  institutions,  to 
promote  civilization,  then  we  ought  to  cleave  to 
them  loyally.  It  is  the  thing  itself,  not  what  defini- 
tion we  may  give  it,  which  is  most  important.  A 
more  ingenious  man  than  Mr.  Abbot  may  arrive  to- 
morrow at  a  more  satisfactory  definition  than  his ;  or 
he  himself  may  revise  his  own  present  definition,  and 
so  find  Christianity  to  be  a  good  thing,  after  all,  and 
not  a  bad  one.  If,  in  consequence  of  the  definition 
he  now  offers  us,  we  abandon  Christianity  to-day;  if 


we  sell  tlie  churches,  disband  the  congregations,  give 
up  public  worship,  and  treat  the  Sunday  like  any 
other  day ;  a  new  definition  might  make  it  necessary, 
to-morrow,  to  rebuild  them  all,  and  at  some  expense 
and  with  some  difficulty  recommence  our  Christian 
operations. 

II.     MR.   abbot's    former    AND     PRESENT    DEFINI- 
TIONS  OF    CHRISTIANITY. 

This  is  not  altogether  an  imaginary  supposition. 
At  the  Unitarian  Conference  held  at  Syracuse,  in 
October,  1866,  Mr.  Abbot  presented  a  definition  of 
Christianity,  quite  different  from  that  which  he  now 
holds.  It  was  as  follows,  proposed  by  him  as  a  sub- 
stitute for  the  Preamble  and  first  article  of  the  Con- 
stitution, and  so  intended  to  make  an  essential  part 
of  the  organic  law.  We  may  properly  presume,  then, 
that  it  was  not  proposed  by  him  without  careful 
consideration : — 

"Whereas,  The  object  of  Christianity  is  the  uni- 
versal diffusion  of  love,  righteousness,  and  truth; 
and  the  attainment  of  this  object  depends,  under 
God,  upon  individual  and  collective  Christian  activ- 
ity ;  and  collective  Christian  activity,  to  be  efficient, 
must  be  thoroughly  organized ;  and 

"Whereas,  Perfect  freedom  of  thought,  which  is 
at  once  the  right  and  the  duty  of  every  human  being, 
always  leads  to  diversity  of  opinion,  and  is  therefore 
hindered  by  common  creeds  or  statements  of  faith ; 
and 

"Whereas,  The  only  reconciliation  of  the  duties 
of  collective  Christian  activity  and  individual  free- 
dom of  thought  lies  in  an  efficient  organization  for 
practical  Christian  work,  based  rather  on  unity  of 
spirit  than  on  uniformity  of  belief: 

"Article  I. — Therefore  the  churches  here  assem- 
bled, disregarding  all  sectarian  or  theological  differ- 
ence^«',  and  offering  a  cordial  fellowship  to  all  who 
will  join  with  them  in  Christian  work,  unite  them- 
selves in  a  common  body,  to  be  known  as  The  Na- 
tional Conference  of  Unitarian  and  Inde- 
pendent Churches." 

At  this  time,  it  is  clear,  he  had  no  objection  to  the 
Christian  name,  for  he  introduces  it  five  times.  He 
defines  "the  object  of  Christianity  to  be  the  univer- 
sal diffusion  of  love,  righteousness,  and  truth,"  a  defi- 
nition which  the  great  majority  of  Christians,  both 
Catholic  and  Protestant,  Orthodox  and  Liberal, 
would  readily  accept.    His  second  proposition  con- 


cerns  the  means  of  accomplishing  this  ohject, — and 
here  also  the  great  majority  of  all  Christian  churches 
would  agree  with  him.  "The  attainment  of  this  ob- 
ject depends,  under  God,  upon  individual  and  collec- 
tive Christian  activity."  His  third  proposition 
would  also  be  acceptable  to  all  those  Christians,  at 
least,  who  believe  in  the  importance  of  churches, 
"Collective  Christian  activity  to  be  efficient  must  be 
thoroughly  organized." 

This  was  the  definition  of  Christianity  given  by 
Mr.  Abbot  a  few  years  ago.  He  has  now  changed 
his  mind.  He  now  does  not  consider  the  object  of 
Christianity  to  be  "the  universal  diffusion  of  love, 
righteousness,  and  truth"  ;  but  instead,  to  destoy  all 
mental  and  moral  freedom  by  setting  up  personal 
authority  over  the  human  mind.  Far  from  believ- 
ing— as  he  did  in  1866 — that  this  "universal  diffusion 
of  love,  righteousness,  and  truth"  could  only  be  ac- 
complished by  CJiristian  activity,  he  now  believes 
that  it  can  only  be  accomplished  by  "anti-Christian" 
activity. 

But  Christianity  itself  in  1875  cannot  have  altered 
very  materially  from  what  it  was  in  1866.  It  has 
now  the  same  merits,  in  the  main,  that  it  had  then ; 
it  had  then  the  same  faults  which  it  has  now.  The 
difference  then  is  only  in  Mr.  Abbot's  mind.  He  has 
hit  on  a  new  definition.  His  former  definition  made 
of  Christianity  the  great  and  almost  the  only  motive 
power  by  which  humanity  can  be  elevated  and  im- 
proved ;  his  present  definition  makes  of  it  the  great 
foe  of  human  progress. 

Hardly  can  our  friend,  in  this  short  time,  have  dis- 
covered so  many  evils,  which  before  were  unnoticed 
by  him,  as  to  change  him  from  the  friend  of  Christ- 
ianity to  its  foe.  He  has  told  us,  indeed,  that  the 
course  taken  by  the  Syracuse  Convention,  in  reject- 
ing his  amendment,  and  that  similar  proceedings  on 
the  part  of  the  Unitarian  Conferences,  have  satisfied 
him  that  he  had  little  to  expect  from  Chris'tian 
churches.  But  certainly  the  action  of  a  small  de- 
nominational Conference  does  not  furnish  a  sufficient 
basis  for  a  deduction  for  or  against  so  large  a  fact  as 
the  Christian  religion.  It  cannot  be  any  new  obser- 
vation of  its  real  nature  which  has  reversed  his 
action ;  it  is  the  discovery  of  a  better  definition.  It 
would  seem,  therefore,  a  very  serious  mistake  to  base 
our  Christianity,  or  anti-Christianity,  on  a  definition, 
or  on  any  purely  logical  process.  It  is  to  be  settled ,  not 
by  any  deductive  process,  but  by  an  induction  from 


observed  facts.  This,  surely,  is  the  scientific  method, 
whicfi  for  a  practical  question  is  much  better  than 
the  metaphysical  one.  We  feel  like  applying  here 
what  Mr.  Emerson  has  somewhere  said,  '*lf  we  could 
have  any  security  against  moods!  If  the  profound- 
est  prophet  could  be  holden  to  his  words,  and  the 
hearer  who  is  ready  to  sell  all  and  join  the  crusade 
could  have  any  security  that  to-morrow  his  prophet 
shall  not  unsay  his  testimony !  But  the  Truth  sits 
veiled  there  on  the  bench,  and  never  interposes  an 
adamantine  syllable ;  and  the  most  sincere  and  revo- 
lutionary doctrine,  put  as  if  the  ark  of  God  was  to 
be  carried  forward  some  furlongs  and  planted  there 
for  the  succor  of  the  world,  shall  in  a  tew  weeks  be 
coldly  set  aside,  by  the  same  speaker,  as  morbid.  *J 
thought  I  was  right,  but  I  was  not,''  and  the  same 
immeasurable  credulity  demanded  for  new  au- 
dacities.'* 

III.   SHALL  WE  ACCEPT    A  DEFIISriTION    OF    CHRIST- 
IANITY ON  THE  AUTHOBITY  OF  THE  CHURCH? 

In  deciding  whether  a  religion  is  good  or  bad,  to  be 
adopted  or  rejected,  the  chief  ground  of  action  is, 
therefore,  hardly  to  be  found  in  a  definition.  We 
should  rather  observe  the  facts,  and  see  whether  an 
induction  from  those  facts  shows  the  spirit  and  in- 
fluence of  the  system  to  be  good  or  otherwise.  To 
this  point  we  shall  presently  return.  But  now  let  us 
examine  Mr.  Abbot's  present  definition  ol  Christ- 
ianity, and  notice  some  of  its  consequences. 

* 'The  consensus  of  all  organized  Christian  bodies, 
more  particularly  Orthodox  Christian  bodies,  ought 
to  determine  it.  That  is,  Christianity  should  be  con- 
ceded to  be  what  the  great  Christian  Church,  as  a 
whole,  declares  it  to  be." 

That  is  to  say,  in  deciding  a  question  of  fact,  we 
are  told  by  Mr.  Abbot  that  we  are  not  to  exercise 
our  own  reason,  but  to  submit  to  the  authority  of  the 
majority.  He  opposes  Christianity  because  "it  rests 
on  the  principle  of  authority,"  and  then  he  accepts 
the  authority  of  the  majority  as  determining  what  is 
fact  and  what  is  truth.  He  renounces  his  own  pri- 
vate judgment,  and  accepts  the  decision  of  the 
Church,  with  the  humility  of  an  ultramontane  Cath- 
olic. In  1866,  after  having  been  a  student  and  a 
preacher  of  Christianity  during  many  years,  his  belief 
was  that  Christianity  was  a  good  thing;  that  it  was 
not  Orthodoxy,  but  a  religion  of  love,  truth,  and 
righteousness.     He  now  gives  up  this  belief  in  def- 


6 

erence  to  the  opinions  of  a  majority;  he  accepts 
blindly  what  the  majority  declares  Christianity 4-0  be, 
though  his  own  studies  had  brought  him  to  an 
opposite  conclusion.  And  all  this  he  does,  and  rec- 
ommends others  to  do,  in  the  interest  of  Free  Re- 
ligion and  spiritual  liberty. 

The  majority  of  a  church  may  have  a  right  to  de- 
cide what  the  belief  of  that  majority  is  concerning 
Christianity.  But  Christianity  itself  is  larger  than 
all  its  denominations,  all  its  churches,  and  all  their 
creeds.  It  is  a  great  system  of  thought  and  life  which 
has  existed  during  eighteen  centuries;  which  has 
taken  on  and  put  off  again  many  forms ;  which  has 
adopted  and  relinquished  many  methods;  which  has 
created  a  remarkable  civilization ;  which  has  united 
most  of  the  great  races  of  mankind  into  a  common 
brotherhood  of  social  and  political  life.  To  allow 
such  a  system  to  be  defined  authoritatively  for  us 
without  appeal  by  the  majority  of  its  believers  at  any 
one  period  would  be  like  accepting  as  a  final  state- 
ment concerning  the  hydrography  of  a  great  river 
the  opinions  of  the  sailors  who  happen  to  be  navigat- 
ing its  stream.  Christians  do  not  make  Christianity ; 
Christianity  makes  Christians,  They  bear  not  the 
root ;  the  root  bears  them. 

This  new  dogma  of  Free  Religion,  which  consists  in 
accepting  the  authority  of  a  majority  in  forming  our 
opinions  •concerning  a  faith,  would,  of  course,  over- 
throw and  discard  all  that  Protestantism  has  accom- 
plished by  its  principle  of  private  judgment. 

If  the  consent  of  the  organized  Church  should  be 
decisive  as  to  what  Christianity  is,  Martin  Luther, 
instead  of  reforming  the  Christian  Church,  should 
have  gone  outside  of  Christianity.  If  he  had  done 
this,  the.Protestant  Reformation  would  never  have 
arrived, — which,  if  it  has  done  nothing  else,  has,  at 
least,  enabled  our  brother  Abbot  to  express  his  opin- 
ions without  being  burnt  for  doing  so. 

If  the  opinion  of  the  majority  determines  what 
Christianity  is,  then  Christianity  is  a  different  relig- 
ion in  different  periods.  In  one  century  the  Arians 
constituted  the  majority  in  the  Church ;  then  Christ- 
ianity was  an  Arian  religion,  and  the  Church  doctrine 
of  the  Trinity  made  no  part  of  it.  Until  Protestantism 
arrived,  the  supremacy  of  the  Bishop  of  Rome  consti- 
tuted an  essential  part  of  Christianity.  If  Protest- 
ants ever  become  the  majority,  it  will  cease  to  do  so. 


IV.  THE  BEAL  MEANING  OF  AUTHORITY  IN    CHRIST- 
IANITY. 

But  perhaps  Mr.  Abbot  may  say  that  the  only  es- 
sential thing  in  Christianity  which  has  always  re- 
mained the  same  is  the  principle  of  authority — espec- 
ially theaiithorityof  Jesus  Christ, — and  that  this  au- 
thority has  always  enslaved  the  human  mind. 

But  if  this  be  so,  we  would  ask  how  it  is  that  the 
human  mind  has  been  most  free,  and  made  its  most 
successful  attainments  just  when  the  Christian  re- 
ligion has  prevailed.  Outside  of  Christendom  there 
is  no  science,  art,  literature,  philosophy,  to  which 
any  students  would  go  to-day  for  instruction.  If,  at 
one  time,  Christians  went  to  Mohammedan  schools 
for  instruction,  we  must  inquire  whether,  strictly 
speaking,  Islam  is  not  a  Christian  heresy,  an  outside 
sect  of  Christendom.  And  why  have  all  Mohamme- 
dan countries  ceased  to  be  sources  of  knowledge  for 
mankind,  while  Christian  countries  are  always  ad- 
vancing? If  Christianity  be  mental  slavery,  why,  we 
ask  again,  does  mental  freedom  only  thrive  where 
Christianity  is  the  prevailing  religion? 

And  is  it  true  that  "the  system  of  faith  and  prac- 
tice known  from  the  beginning  as  Orthodoxy"  has 
always  been  the  same?  The  history  of  doctrines 
shows  that  every  doctrine  now  held  in  the  Church  as 
Orthodox,  has  at  one  time  been  regarded  as  heretical, 
— such  as  the  doctrines  of  the  Trinity,  of  the  atone- 
ment, of  total  depravity,  of  the  papal  supremacy,  of 
the  mass,  of  the  literal  inspiration  of  the  Bible.  If 
this,  therefore,  be  Christianity,  there  is  no  such  thing 
as  one  permanent  Christianity ;  but  Christianity  has 
been  one  thing  in  one  century,  and  a  wholly  different 
thing  in  another.  But  in  seeking  a  definition  of  a 
religion  we  must  find  something  which  will  define  it 
throughout  its  whole  history.  This  definition  there- 
fore must  be  incorrect. 

Is,  then,  the  essence  of  Christianity  ^ ^per son-wor- 
ship^^ f  So  our  friend  seems  to  assert  in  one  of  his 
paragraphs.  He  seems  to  say  that  the  slavery  of  the 
human  mind  has  resulted  from  making  the  authority 
of  Jesus  Christ  supreme  over  faith.  No  doubt  the 
authority  of  Jesus,  as  an  inspired  teacher,  makes  a 
part  of  the  creed  of  Christendom.  He  is  accepted  by 
ail  Christians  not  only  as  a  teacher,  but  also  a  mas- 
ter. But  so  far  from  this  authority  of  Christ  produc- 
ing spiritual  slavery,  it  is,  when  rightly  apprehended, 
a  service  which  is  perfect  freedom,  and  is  a  source  of 
mental  and  moral  progress. 


8 

For  we  must  distinguish  between  two  kinds  of  au- 
thority,— of  which  the  one  enslaves,  and  the  other 
emancipates.  One  is  the  authority  of  the  letter,  the 
other  of  the  spirit.  To  repeat  words  on  the  authority 
of  another;  to  accept  a  creed,  whether  we  understand 
it  or  not ;  to  receive  and  repeat  blindly  a  verbal  state- 
ment,— that  is  mental  slavery.  But  to  catch  the  in- 
spiration of  another's  spirit;  to  feed  our  minds  by 
the  sight  of  the  truth  which  he  has  seen  before;  to 
take  him  as  guide,  leader,  teacher,  master, — this  is 
one  method  by  which  the  human  mind  is  set  free. 
Every  earnest  seeker  for  truth  has  some  such  mas- 
ters. Some  take  Shakspeare,  Bacon,  Plato,  Socra- 
tes for  their  masters.  Others  take  Channing,  Park- 
er, Emerson,  Carlyle,  Goethe,  Herbert  Spencer,  Dar- 
win, Tyndall,  Huxley.  If  they  follow  these  masters 
blindly,  accepting  all  they  say  without  examination, 
they  are  finally  belittled  and  enslaved  by  them.  They 
repeat  by  rote  Emerson's  sayings,  and  become  his 
parrots.  They  may  do  the  same  with  the  sayings  of 
Christ.  Or  they  may  go  to  these  masters  for  inspira- 
tion and  guidance,  not  blindly,  but  with  an  intelligent 
faith.  They  may  say, '  "They  have  helped  us  wonder- 
fully in  the  past,  and  therefore  we  trust  in  them. 
We  go  to  their  words  with  expectation  and  confi- 
dence— a  confidence  justified  by  our  past  experience. 
We  read  their  books  in  faith,  and  that  faith  helps  us 
to  better  insight:'' 

Does  it  make  any  difference  that  Christians  assume 
Christ  to  be  an  infallible  teacher,  while  other  mas- 
ters are  supposed  to  be  fallible?  Practically  it 
makes  no  difference.  We  go  to  Emerson,  to  Plato, 
to  any  teacher,  for  truth,  not  for  error.  We  go  to 
them  for  knowledge.  If  what  they  say  seems  to  us 
obscure,  self-contradictory,  or  false,  we  let  it  alone, 
and  read  on  till  we  can  find  something  which  we  can  ^ 
understand  and  believe.  When  we  stop  to  criticise 
ana  find  fault,  we  lose  our  teacher,  and  cease  to  be 
disciples.  So  long  as  we  are  learning  truth  from 
them,  we  continue  in  the  attitude  of  faith.  We  be- 
lieve all  we  can ;  as  to  what  we  cannot  believe,  we 
wait  and  consider.  If  we  relinquish  this  attitude  for 
a  moment,  in  that  moment  we  cease  to  be  learners, 
and  become  critics. 

All  Christians,  in  studying  the  teachings  of  Jesus, 
are  in  this  attitude.  They  are  looking  for  truth,  not 
for  falsehood  and  error.  They  are  not  blindly  ac- 
cepting his  statements,  but  they  are  studying  them 
to  find  what  they  mean.     If  they  find  something 


9 

they  cannot  understand,  they  wait  till  they  can  un- 
derstand it.  As  it  is  impossible  for  the  human  mind 
to  hold  at  the  same  time  two  propositions  which  are 
seen  to  be  contradictory,  we  are  just  as  much  obliged 
to  suspend  our  opinion  in  reading  the  words  of  Jesus 
as  we  are  in  reading  those  of  Socrates.  If  what 
Jesus  says  in  one  place  seems  inconsistent  with  what 
we  have  learned  from  him  elsewhere,  or  what  we 
have  learned  in  other  ways,  then  we  are  compelled, 
by  the  law  of  our  mind,  to  suspend  our  judgment  till 
we  are  able  either  to  reconcile  the  two  opinions,  or  to 
decide  between  them.  Not  a  single  body  of  Christ- 
ians teaches  that  we  are  blindly  to  accept  and  repeat 
the  words  of  Jesus  without  seeing  their  reasonable- 
ness. Paul  said  that  the  letter  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment killed,  and  that  only  its  spirit  gave  life.  We 
must  always  remember,  too,  that,  admitting  this 
authority  of  Christ  to  be  a  part  of  Christianity,  the 
Church  has  held  to  entirely  different  methods  of  dis- 
covering its  deliverances.  Catholics  say,  "You  must 
go  to  the  Church  to  find  what  Christ  teaches,"  Prot- 
estants say,  "You  must  goto  the  Bible;"  but  then 
they  claim  that  each  man's  judgment  is  to  decide 
what  the  Bible  teaches,  and  that  according  to  the 
analogy  of  faith.  All  mystics,  like  the  Sweden- 
borgians  and  Quakers,  say  that  Christ  speaks  to  each 
man's  soul  through  the  spirit,  and  whatever  each 
man  sees  to  be  true  is  true  to  him.  Even  Dr.  New- 
man, the  Catholic,  has  recently  shown  that  a  distinct 
declaration  of  the  infallible  pope  will  not  be  accepted 
by  many  Catholics  till  they  have  satisfied  themselves 
that  he  was  under  no  bad  influence  in  giving  it, — 
which  leaves  a  broad  margin  for  individual  freedom. 

The  principle  of  authority,  after  all  these  reduc- 
tions, would  scarcely  seem  to  amount  to  more  than 
this :  that  Christ  is  an  inexhaustible  source  of  divine 
truth  to  the  soul.  What  that  truth  is,  must  be  de- 
cided by  finding  that  which  satisfies  the  reason,  con- 
science, and  heart.  And  this  is  the  way  in  which  we 
judge  all  truth  to  be  true. 

The  essential  thing  in  a  religion,  and  the  only  es- 
sential thing,  is  that  which  was  in  it  in  the  beginning, 
in  its  source  and  fountain,  and  which  has  continued 
in  it  ever  since.  The  papacy  does  not  belong  to  the 
essence  of  Christianity;  for  that  did  not  appear  until 
the  Middle  Ages.  Orthodoxy  in  doctrine  does  not 
belong  to  the  essence  of  Christianity,  for  that  was 
unknown  at  first,  and  is  not  to  be  found  in  the 
earliest  sources.    The  only  essential  points  which 


10 

remain,  which  were  in  the  religion  at  first,  and  have 
continued  in  it  ever  since,  are  faith  in  Jesus  as  the 
Christ  the  Son  of  God,  and  the  practical  purpose  of 
attaining  that  love  to  God  and  love  to  man  of  which 
he  is  the  Mediator. 

Perhaps,  on  some  other  occasion,  I  shall  endeavor 
to  show  that  this  faith  is  not  only  not  inconsistent 
with  truth  and  freedom,  hut  is  the  best  source  of 
both  to  mankind.  N'o  doubt  vast  numbers  of  Christ- 
ians have  been  the  slaves  of  a  literal  dogmatism. 
But  it  is  so  in  all  systems, — in  science,  art,  philoso- 
phy. The  majority  of  disciples,  in  all  these,  swear 
by  the  words  of  the  Master,  instead  of  penetrating  his 
spirit.  This  is  not  the  fault  of  Christianity,  but  of 
the  human  mind,  in  its  imperfect  development. 


The  Battle  of  Ideas  at  Syracuse. 

AN    ESSAY   BEAD    BEFORE    A    PRIVATE    CLUB    IN    BOSTOKy 

APRIL  26,  1875. 


BY  FRANCIS  E.  ABBOT. 

• 
The  candid  and  catholic-spirited  paper  read  at  the 
February  meeting  of  this  Club  by  Dr.  Clarke,  *^0n  a 
Eecent  Definition  of  Christianity,"  furnishes  the 
most  appropriate  and  timely  topic  on  which  I  could 
address  you  this  afternoon;  and,  without  attempting 
to  consider  in  detail  the  various  points  he  raised,  I 
would  nevertheless  ask  your  kindly  attention  to  some 
further  thought  upon  the  same  general  subject — cer- 
tainly the  most  important  one  which  presents  itself  to 
students  of  modern  religious  tendencies. 

DEFINITIONS. 

Quoting  a  passage  from  The  Index  which  em- 
phasized the  importance  of  a  "true  definition  of 
Christianity, *'  Dr.  Clarke  understood  me  to  assume 
that  *Hhis  is  the  first  point  to  be  determined  in  order 
to  decide  whether  or  not  we  shall  take  sides  with 
Christianity  or  against  it."  It  is  quite  immaterial 
now  whether  the  passage  quoted  was  well  or  ill 
phrased;  very  likely  the  meaning  he  found  in  it 
might  be  naturally  gathered  from  it,  though  such 
was  not  the  meaning  I  intended.  But  I  am  glad  to 
agree  with  him  that  our  relations  to  Christianity  can- 
not wisely  be  determined  by  a  regard  for  mere  words 


12 


or  forms  of  statement,  since  I  do  not  lay  the  chief 
emphasis  on  any  formula.  It  is  the  thing  itself,  and 
not  the  name,  that  is  supremely  important.  Not- 
withstanding, I  believe  that  the  truth  of  our  thoughts 
about  things  depends  to  a  very  large  extent  upon  the 
exactness  of  the  language  we  use  concerning  them; 
and  if  we  cannot  u^e  names  exactly,  I  more  than 
doubt  whether  we  know  things  correctly.  Wh9n  a 
teacher,  in  response  to  a  question  about  the  lesson, 
is  told  by  his  pupil,  *'I  know  the  answer,  but  I  can- 
not express  myself,"  it  would  be  a  very  foolish  teach- 
er who  Ihould  be  satisfied  that  the  pupil  really  knew 
he  answer  as  it  ought  to  be  known.  Inexact,  con- 
fused language  is  always,  I  believe,  the  result  of  in- 
exact, confused  thought;  that  is,  of  imperfect  knowl- 
edge. Hence  I  believe  it  to  be  of  the  greatest  conse- 
quence to  possess  an  exact  and  truthful  definition  of 
Christianity — not  at  all  for  the  sake  of  the  definition 
as  a  mere  string  of  words,  but  for  the  sake  of  the 
exact  knowledge  of  the  thing  itself  which  it  implies. 
To  borrow  Dr.  Clarke's  illustration,  the  man  who 
could  not  tell  exactly  what  the  Feudal  system  was 
would  be  in  no  condition  to  decide  whether  he  ought 
to  uphold  it  or  oppose  it, — in  no  condition  to  decide 
whether  that  method  of  organizing  society  was  a 
good  or  a  bad  one.  He  should  know  exactly  what  it 
was  that  he  was  going  to  uphold  or  oppose ;  and  if  he 
did  know  exactly,  he  could  tell  exactly.  Men  must 
often  act,  it  is  true,  on  very  insufficient  knowledge ; 
buu  that  is  precisely  the  reason  why  they  so  often 
commit  frightful  mistakes.  Whoever  wants  to  act 
wisely  must  seek  to  know  exactly ;  and  whoever  is 
determined  to  know  exactly  will  soon  discover  the 
importance  of  exact  definitions. 

Let  me,  then,  plead  **not  guilty"  to  the  charge  of 
over-valuing  definitions  for  their  own  sake :  it  is  only 
for  the  sake  of  the  things  they  stand  for  that  I  value 
them  at  all.  It  is  our  ideas  of  the  things  that  must 
determine  our  voluntary  relations  with  them,  and 
definitions  are  merely  the  symbols  or  verbal  expres- 
sions of  ideas.  I  am  pleased,  therefore,  to  be  able  to 
agree  so  heartily  as  I  do  with  Dr.  Clarke,  when  he 
says:  *'Itis  the  thing  itself,  not  what  definition  we 
may  give  it,  which  is  most  important."  Yet  it  still 
remains  true  that  wrong  definitions  are  misrepresen- 
tations of  things,  and  misrepresentations  of  things 
often  lead  us  into  the  gravest  and  most  disastrous 
practical  mistakes  in  life.    "What  is  it?"— is  a  ques- 


13 

tion  that  must  precede  the  other — "What  shall  I  do 
with  it?"  And  to  answer  the  question  is  to  give  a 
definition. 

CHANGINa  DEFINITIONS. 

Experience,  then,j5vill  eventually  control  and  shape 
the  definitions  that**  men  adopt.  Definitions  must 
change  as  things  change,  on  the  one  hand,  and  as 
men's  knowledge  of  them  changes,  on  the  other 
hand.  When  Dr.  Clarke  refers,  so  pointedly  and 
with  so  much  emphasis,  to  what  he  calls  my  own 
"former  and  present  definitions  of  Christianity," — 
when  he  conveys  the  implication  that,  since  "Christ- 
ianity itself  in  1875  cannot  have  altered  very  ma- 
terially from  what  it  was  in  1866,"  and  since  "the 
difference  is  only  in  Mr.  Abbot's  mind,"  therefore  I 
may  hit  to-morrow  on  a  new  definition,  and  deny  all 
that  I  now  maintain,  I  think  you  will  pardon  me  for 
dwelling  a  little  on  the  reasons  of  the  change  he  truly 
points  out;  especially  as  these  reasons  so  vitally 
concern  great  and  growing  movements  of  thought  in 
which  we  are  all  deeply  interested,  in  one  way  or  in 
another. 

In  the  first  place,  I  must  in  all  seriousness  disown 
proprietorship  of  any  sort  in  what  Dr.  Clarke  desig- 
nates as  "Mr.  Abbot's  former  and  present  definitions 
of  Christianity."  I  am  not  aware  of  having  at  any 
time  "hit  on  a  new  definition,"  whether  it  was  really 
a  hit  or  a  miss.  I  was  born  and  educated  among 
Unitarians;  I  was  admitted  to  the  Unitarian  min- 
istry before  Unitarianism  had  any  organized  secta- 
rian existence,  and  before  any  of  its  organizations 
had  authority  to  represent  its  churches  in  any  gen- 
eral ecclesiastical  manner.  There  was  no  denomina- 
tional creed,  and  nothing  that  even  looked  like  one 
in  those  days ;  there  were  plenty  of  individual  state- 
ments of  belief,  many  of  them  published  by  the 
American  Unitarian  Association,  which,  however, 
is  a  voluntary  association  of  individuals,  and  not  of 
churches.  These  individual  statements  were  mostly 
conservative,  but  they  committed  only  their  authors ; 
and  every  man  was  free  to  make  and  publish  his 
own,  without  being  liable  to  have  it  compared  with 
any  "Preamble"  test  of  denominational  Orthodoxy. 

At  the  Autumnal  Convention  in  Springfield,  in 
1863,  the  radicals  seemed  to  be  decidedly  in  the  as- 
cendant ;  the  convention  was  not  a  delegate  one,  but 
attended  by  whosoever  chose  to  go ;  and  the  buoyant, 
expansive  sentiment  of  the  occasion,  all  in  favor  of 


14 

tinlimited  mental  freedom  and  of  unrestricted  spirit- 
ual fellowship,  shed  a  beautiful  light  in  advance  on 
the  ministerial  path  on  which  I  was  just  entering. 
Mr.  Frothingham  was  the  most  admired  and  ap- 
plauded of  the  speakers,  and  represented  the  prevail- 
ing spirit  of  the  meeting;  in  fact,  his  brilliant  suc- 
cess at  Springfield  gave  the  alarm  to  the  conservative 
managers,  and  was,  I  believe,  one  of  the  reasons  why 
that  was  the  last  Autumnal  Convention  ever  held  on 
the  old  non-ecclesiastical  plan. 

Now  the  definition  of  Christianity  which  Dr. 
Clarke  alludes  to  as  my  * 'former  definition"  was  in 
substance  one  of  those  which  I  had  simply  inherited : 
namely,  '"Christianity  is  a  spirit  and  life,  not  a 
creed.'*  I  supposed  that  "the  right  of  free  inquiry" 
was  unchallenged  and  uncurtailed ;  that  every  Uni- 
tarian would  unhesitatingly  concede  it  for  others  and 
affirm  it  for  himself ;  that  every  Unitarian  organiza- 
tion would  be  not  only  willing,  but  eager,  to  make  it 
the  very  first  plank  of  their  platform.  On  this  ac- 
knowledged and  jealously-guarded  principle  I  sup- 
posed that  all  Unitarians  to  a  man  stood  with  one 
accord ;  and  that,  this  being  what  the  conservative 
wing  cherished  as  dearly  as  did  the  radical  wing, 
both  wings  would  also  unite  on  the  principle  that 
"Christianity  is  a  spirit  and  life,  not  a  creed." 
These  two  principles  I  had  always  heard  emphasized 
as  distinctive  of  Unitarian  Christianity;  and  I  took 
them  for  granted  by  simple  inheritance,  until  my 
own  reflection  led  me  to  affirm  them  by  independent 
conviction.  The  definition  of  ChrisUanity  as  "a 
spirit  and  life,  not  a  creed,"  was  certainly  no  inven- 
tion of  mine ;  I  do  not  know  to  this  day  who  first  in- 
vented it,  but  I  know  I  received  it  second-hand,  and 
afterwards  affirmed  it  with  intelligent  conviction  as 
a  grand  spiritual  truth  to  which  my  very  soul 
assented  as  divine. 

With  these  views  I  was  delighted  with  the  proposal 
to  "organize  the  Liberal  Church  of  America,"  out  of 
which  ultimately  grew  the  National  Conference  of 
Unitarian  and  other  Christian  Churches.  That 
wording  of  the  call,  I  feel  very  confident,  was  con- 
tained in  the  first  circular  I  received  on  the  subject, 
though  I  have  lost  this  and  have  never  seen  it  since. 
"The  Liberal  Church  of  America!"  What  a  mag- 
nificent idea!  How  it  fired  enthusiasm !  How  eager 
it  made  me  to  go  myself,  and  to  have  my  Dover 
church  represented  at  the  first  convention  at  New 
York,  in  April,  1865 !    It  was  a  great  and  noble  con- 


15 

Tention  that  then  aesembled.  It  opened  splendidly 
in  the  overwhelming  rejection  by  the  delegates,  Dr. 
Bellows  at  their  head,  of  the  proposition  by  Mr.  A. 
A.  Low  to  adopt  a  stiff  Unitarian  creed.  Then  came 
the  discussion,  cut  off  summarily  by  the  "previous 
question,"  on  the  famous  Preamble,  which  contained 
an  explicit  avowal  of  faith  in  the  Lordship  and  King- 
ship of  Jesus  Christ,  but  not  a  word  on  the  "un- 
limited right  of  free  inquiry"  and  "Christianity  a 
spirit  and  life,  not  a  creed."  That  Preamble  was 
adopted  without  any  adequate  discussion  of  the  pro- 
found issues  involved  in  such  action.  Dr.  Bellows, 
however,  declared  that  enough  had  been  done  for 
the  first  year,  and  that  "the  Broad  Church  question 
must  be  postponed  till  next  year."  That  more  than 
half-promise  partly  consoled  me  for  bitter  disappoint- 
ment at  the  adoption  of  that  creed-like  Preamble : 
one  chance  still  remained  to  fulfil  the  professions 
that  had  brought  at  least  one  obscure  country  min- 
ister to  New  York. 

In  1866  came  the  Syracuse  Conference.  A  sub- 
stitute for  the  adopted  Preamble  was  offered  which 
affirmed  three  things:  first,  that  "the  object  of 
Christianity  is  the  universal  diffusion  of  Love, 
Eighteousness,  and  Truth,"  which  is  only  a  para- 
phrase of  the  familiar  principle  that  "Christianity  is 
a  spirit  and  life,  not  a  creed" ;  secondly,  that  "per- 
fect freedom  of  thought  is  at  once  the  right  and  duty 
of  every  human  being,"  which  is  only  a  paraphrase 
of  the  familiar  principle  of  the  "unlimited  right  of 
free  inquiry";  and,  thirdly,  that  the  basis  of  organ- 
ization should  be  "unity  of  spirit  rather  than  uni- 
formity of  belief."  This,  I  thought,  was  the  very  es- 
senpe  of  genuine  Unitarian  Christianity,  the  corner- 
stone of  "the  Liberal  Church  of  America" ;  and  I 
saw  no  reason  why  a  Unitarian  Christian  Conference 
could  not  plant  itself  on  this  grand  spiritual  founda- 
tion. It  was  indeed  the  fork  of  the  road,  where  two 
possible  futures,  wide  as  the  poles  apart  in  their  re- 
ligious character,  opened  before  the  most  advanced, 
cultured,  and  intelligent,  though  one  of  the  smallest, 
of  all  the  Christian  denominations.  One  branch  of 
the  road  led  to  the  camp  of  the  old  creed-bound  sects, 
with  a  compact  ecclesiastical  organization  that  would 
slowly  and  insensibly  tighten  its  grasp  on  every  mem- 
ber and  set  an  impassable  limit  to  spiritual  freedom. 
The  other  branch  of  the  road  led  to  the  great  host  of 
those  who  were  seeking  in  isolation  to  explore 
Truth's  untried  fields,  with  a  free  and  hospitable  fel- 


16 


lowship  that  should  welcome  every  truth-lover,  and 
he  an  inspiration,  a  help,  and  a  friend  in  his  lonely 
search  for  ideal  excellence. 

Nay,  more  than  this.  Not  only  did  the  Unitarian 
denomination  come  to  the  turning-point  of  its  own 
destiny,  as  a  small  but  influential  company  of  re- 
ligious liberals;  but  Christianity  itself  was 
BBOUGHT  to  THE  CRUCIAL.  TEST,  in  the  decision  that 
must  be  made  between  the  principles  of  those  two 
Preambles,  the  old  and  the  new.  Could  it,  as  here 
represented  by  the  intellectual  and  spiritual  van- 
guard of  its  forces,  reconcile  itself  to  that  absolute 
liberty  of  thought  and  speech  which  is  the  soul  of 
science,  of  civilization,  of  modern  progress  in  all  its 
aspects ;  or  must  it,  by  the  inherent  law  of  its  own 
innermost  being,  sacrifice  this  vital  principle  in  order 
to  keep  flying  the  banner  of  the  Lordship  and  King- 
ship of  Jesus  Christ?  Here  for  the  first  time  (I 
think  also  for  the  last  time)  was  a  clean  issue  made 
between  the  first  of  persons  and  the  first  of  ideas ; 
and  as  its  choice  was,  so  should  its  future  be.  If  it 
could  only  prove  itself  compatible  with  modern  prog- 
ress by  boldly  taking  the  lead  of  it,  and  pledging 
itself  to  perfect  spiritual  freedom  (which,  depend 
upon  it,  the  world  will  have  at  any  and  every  cost), 
then  Christianity  would  indeed  demonstrate  its  own 
imperishability,  its  own  capacity  of  developing  into 
Free  Keligion  without  the  name.  But  if  not,  then 
the  sceptre  must  pass  out  of  its  hand ;  it  must  fade 
slowly  away  before  a  successor  greater  than  itself; 
it  must  make  room  f gr  the  religion  of  perfect  freedom 
and  universal  fellowship ;  it  must  die,  that  Humanity 
might  live.  Christianity  itself,  I  say,  was  brought 
to  the  crucial  test  in  the  issue  made  between  those 
two  Preambles ;  for  if  the  Christianity  of  the  freest 
of  all  Christian  sects  could  not  reconcile  itself  with 
perfect  freedom,  of  course  the  Christianity  of  no 
other  Christian  body  could  do  it.  It  was  a  great 
historic  moment,  and  history  will  yet  recognize  its 
vast  and  as  yet  wholly  unappreciated  importance. 

These,  and  no  smaller  or  meaner  OLes,  were  the 
issues  decided  that  bright  October  day  in  Samuel  J. 
May's  church  in  Syracuse.  Never  again,  I  believe  in 
my  very  soul,  will  the  conditions  recur  when  that  de- 
cision can  be  reconsidered. 

The  evening  before  the  Conference  met,  I  went  to 
the  Secretary,  Rev.  E.  E.  Hale,  notified  him  of  my 
intention  to  bring  up  this  question,  and  asked  when 
it  could  be  considered.    He  named  the  second  day  of 


17 

the  only  two  days  of  the  session;  to  which  I  of 
coarse  offered  no  objection.  But  that  same  night  I 
had  several  hundred  copies  of  the  **proposed  substi- 
tute'* for  the  Preamble  printed,  and  the  next  morn- 
ing had  them  distributed  throughout  the  pews,  to 
prevent  beforehand  any  parliamentary  suffocation  of 
the  movement  in  the  business  committee ;  for  I  was 
determined,  if  possible,  to  have  that  great  question 
fairly  and  fully  discussed  by  the  Conference,  and  not 
choked  off  as  it  had  been  at  New  York.  The  attempt 
was  successful.  Finding  that  the  distribution  of  the 
printed  ^^substitutes"  had  brought  the  matter  promi- 
nently before  the  whole  convention,  and  that  it  could 
not  be  suppressed.  Dr.  F.  H.  Hedge  took  the  bull  by 
the  horns,  and  moved  that  the  question  be  taken  up 
at  once.  This  was  done,  and  a  whole  day  was  spent 
in  the  discussion.  Dr.  Bellows  rallied  his  hosts  at 
noon,  and  late  in  the  afternoon  had  won  the  victory. 
The  new  Preamble,  with  its  old  Unitarian  principles 
of  unlimited  free  inquiry  and  a  purely  spiritual 
Christianity,  was  rejected. 

The  most  influential  man  in  winning  that  victory, 
next  perhaps  to  Dr.  Bellows,  was  James  Freeman 
Clarke.  He  said  then  that  the  Lordship  of  Jesus 
could  not  be  taken  out  of  the  Preamble,  once  being  in 
it ;  that,  if  the  new  Preamble  had  been  first  offered 
the  previous  year  at  New  York,  he  thought  it  would 
have  been  adopted;  but  that,  if  adopted  now,  it 
would  look  like  hauling  down  the  Christian  flag,  and 
he  could  not  vote  for  that.  These  arguments,  more 
than  all  others,  I  believe,  decided  the  mind  of  the 
Conference ;  and  the  new  Preamble  was  voted  down 
by  a  two-thirds  vote.  To  one,  at  least,  of  that  As- 
sembly, when  the  night  came,  it  was  night  indeed ; 
the  very  sun  of  Unitarian! sm,  the  one  great  principle 
of  Channing,  the  one  glorious  inspiration  of  Parker, 
the  divine  idea  of  perfect  spiritual  freedom^  had  set  for 
it  forever.    I  never  went  to  bed  a  sadder  man. 

But  for  the  adverse  vote  of  that  day,  there  would 
have  been  no  Free  Religious  Association,  and  no  In- 
dex. Out  of  that  apparent  defeat  the  principles  of 
perfect  spiritual  freedom  and  universal  spiritual  fel- 
lowship emerged  unconquered,  notwithstanding. 
They  lived  in  too  many  hearts  to  be  thus  summarily 
extinguished.  The  Syracuse  Conference  might  have 
secured  the  long-continued  attachment  of  these 
many  hearts  by  a  different  vote ;  but  it  spurned  lib- 
erty in k Christ's  name,  and  one  by  one  they  began 
to  leave.    I,  at  least,  should  in  all  probability  have 


18 

lived  and  died  a  Unitarian  Christian  minister,  and 
Dr.  Clarke  would  never  have  written  his  not  un- 
kindly comments  on  my  "change  of  definition." 
But  I  was  taught  by  events ;  I  got  the  first  lessons  of 
my  anti-Christian  education  at  Syracuse,  and  from 
Dr.  Clarke. 

When  the  smoke  of  the  battle  was  over,  I  began  to 
ponder  intensely  the  real  causes  of  that  strange  de- 
feat. Why  should  Unitarians,  in  solemn  council  as- 
sembled, reject  the  ancient  principles  that  had  given 
the  Unitarian  name  all  its  glory — the  * 'unlimited  right 
of  free  inquiry,"  and  '^Christianity  a  spirit  and  life, 
not  a  creed"  ?  The  answer  was  long  in  coming ;  but 
later  events  gave  added  lessons,  and  it  came.  At  last 
I  saw  that  I  had  no  reason  to  wonder,  still  less  to  be 
displeased,  at  the  action  of  that  Conference.  The 
members  were  most  excellent  and  honest  men — none 
better  anywhere ;  they  had  doubtless  voted  under  the 
influence  of  the  highest  motives ;  I  must  look  deeper 
than  to  any  personal  causes  for  the  true  solution  of 
the  problem.  I  found  it  in  the  very  nature  of  Christ- 
ianity ;  Dr.  Clarke  showed  me  where.  When  this  as- 
semblage of  Unitarian  Christians  were  brought  face 
to  face  with  the  alternatives,  either  to  vote  down  the 
principles  of  perfect  freedom  and  a  purely  impersonal 
Christianity,  or  else  to  ''haul  down  the  Christian 
flag"  and  seemingly  deny  their  allegiance  to  their 
personal  Lord,  and  Savior,  and  King,  they  could 
not,  as  Christians^  do  otherwise  than  they  did.  As 
thinkers,  as  men,  they  would  have  voted  for  freedom ; 
as  Christians,  they  could  only  vote  for  Christianity. 

To  Christianity,  therefore,  must  I  credit  this  point- 
blank  rejection  of  liberty  at  Syracuse;  and  so,  be- 
cause I  love  liberty  better  than  Christ,  Dr.  Clarke 
taught  me  the  anti-Christianity  which  he  now  tries 
in  vain  to  unteach.  He  has  taught  me  himself  that 
my  "former  definition"  of  Christianity,  which  I  in- 
herited from  my  early  Unitarian  education,  is  a  false 
one ;  he  himself  helped  to  prove  it  false  at  Syracuse. 
Giving  up  that,  therefore,  I  did  not  sit  down  to  in- 
vent a  new  one ;  but,  in  the  light  of  experience  and 
Dr.  Clarke's  involuntary  tuitions,  I  have  learned  that 
history  only  repeated  itself  at  Syracuse — that  the 
Church  has  always  and  everywhere  voted  the  same 
way,  against  freedom  in  the  name  of  its  own  Lord  ; 
though  never,  I  suppose,  was  the  issue  between 
freedom  and  Christianity  made  so  clean  as  then. 
Such  uniform  action  must  have  its  cause  in  the  very 
nature  of  the  Christian  religion.    It  is  the  Church, 


19 


therefore,  the  universal  Church  of  Christendom,  that 
holds  the  secret  of  Christianity;  and  from  the 
Church,  therefore,  I  have  simply  taken  the  definition 
that  it  gives. 

When,  consequently,  Dr.  Clarke  tells  me,  in  his 
own  fraternal  way,  that  I  once  made  a  new  definition 
of  Christianity  at  Syracuse,  that  I  make  another  new 
one  to-day,  and  that  I  may  yet  make  a  third  new  one 
to-morrow,  my  answer  is  merely  this :  That  at  Syra- 
cuse I  substantially  adopted  one  of  the  definitions 
which  Unitarianism  itself  invented  a  half-century 
ago ;  that  to-day  I  substantially  adopt  the  definition 
which  the  whole  Christian  Church  has  been  making 
in  the  past  two  thousand  years ;  and  that,  in  the  con- 
troversy between  the  new  definition  made  by  Unita- 
rianism and  the  old  definition  made  by  the  Church 
Universal,  I  now  think  the  Church  right  where  I 
once  thought  Unitarianism  right.  I  have  not,  there- 
fore, introduced  a  new  one  at  all,  and  the  ancient 
controversy  respecting  Christianity  between  Unitari- 
anism and  Orthodoxy  is  simply  revived.  The  only 
difference  is  that  Radicalism  to-day  holds  that  in  this 
controversy  touching  the  essence  of  Christianity  Or- 
thodoxy has  the  best  of  the  argument ;  for  the  rea- 
son that  Dr.  Clarke  and  his  friends,  in  order  to  remain 
Christian,  were  forced  to  surrender  the  liberal  defini- 
tion of  Christianity  at  Syracuse,  and  plant  themselves 
on  the  essence  of  the  Orthodox  definition  as  the  only 
tenable  Christian  ground.  Unitarian  Christianity 
gave  testimony  against  itself  that  day,  and  deprived 
Radicalism  of  all  opportunity  to  defend  it  further. 

What  does  this  all  prove?  That  I  "changed  my 
definition,"  and  have  changed  my  principles  thereby? 
Not  at  all.  But  that  the  same  principles  of  perfect 
spiritual  freedom  and  universal  spiritual  fellowship 
for  which  I  pleaded  at  Syracuse,  with  all  the  earnest- 
ness of  intense  conviction,  in  that  name  of  Unitari- 
anism which  I  inherited  from  my  fathers,  I  still 
plead  for  to-day,  but  in  the  new  name  of  Free  Relig- 
ion. Unitarianism  itself  has  changed  its  principles, 
not  I.  It  began  with  ideas  it  has  been  obliged  to  re- 
nounce by  its  own  authoritative,  collective  voice,  in 
order  to  save  its  Christian  connection  and  name ;  and 
it  can  never  rectify  its  great  mistake  excep.t  by  re- 
pealing its  present  Preamble,  and  coming  forward  to 
Free  Religion.  The  golden  opportunity  of  identify- 
ing Christianity  with  Free  Religion  has  been  lost  for- 
ever; and  nothing  now  remains  but  either  to  side 
with  Orthodoxy  as  essential  Christianity,  or  to  side 


20 


with  unlimited  freedom  and  fellowship  as  essential 
Free  ReJigion.  It  has  made  this  issue  itself;  it  has 
made  its  own  children  anti-Christian,  as  the  only  way 
to  maintain  fealty  to  the  principles  it  taught  them  it- 
self to  stand  for.  Between  fidelity  to  ideas  and  fidel- 
ity to  names  they  have  been  forced  by  Unitarianism 
to  choose ;  and  therein  consists  all  the  "change"  that 
Dr.  Clarke  can  prove  against  me. 

ACCEPTING  DEFINITIONS  ON  AUTHOBITY. 

But  Dr.  Clarke  considers  that  I  submit  to  the  very 
principle  of  authority  which  I  disown,  when  I  con- 
sent to  take  the  definition  of  Christianity  offered  by 
the  Church  itself  as  the  only  true  one.  This  is  not  a 
point  that  need  detain  us  long.  The  question  is  sim- 
ply as  to  the  competency  of  witnesses.  The  principle 
of  freedom  requires  no  man  to  determine  questions  of 
fact  by  appealing  to  his  own  consciousness ;  and  what 
Christianity  is  is  nothing  but  a  question  of  fact. 
Whose  testimony  as  to  the  fact  is  most  trustworthy  ? 

I  find  the  Church  Universal  speaking  out  of  its 
own  experience  and  history  of  nearly  nineteen  cent- 
uries, and  declaring  that  Orthodoxy  is  that  Christian 
religion  of  which  itself  has  been  from  the  beginning 
the  only  custodian  and  natural  exponent.  I  find  the 
Unitarian  denomination  speaking  out  of  its  own  brief 
life  and  career  of  some  fifty  years,  and  declaring  that 
the  Christian  religion  is  its  own  transformed  and 
modernized  faith;  that  the  ancient  Orthodoxy  of 
which  it  is  itself  only  a  recent  offshoot  is  a  mere  cor- 
ruption of  the  primal  gospel ;  and  that  the  great  bulk 
of  the  Christian  world,  with  its  hundreds  of  millions 
of  believers,  is  really  in  dense  ignorance  of  its  own  re- 
ligion !  Dr.  Clarke  thinks  one  witness  the  more  cred- 
ible, and  I  the  other;  that  is  all  the  difference. 
Neither  he  nor  I  do  more  in  this  matter  than  accept 
the  testimony  of  the  best  witness  to  a  mere  matter  of 
fact.  There  is  no  "submission  to  authority"  here  in 
any  sense  that  either  of  us  objects  to.  What  Christ- 
ianity is,  is  only  a  question  of  fact ;  what  authority  it 
possesses,  is  more  than  a  mere  question  of  fact.  Dr. 
Clarke  holds  that  it  does  possess  a  vital  aumority  over 
the  intellect,  the  conscience,  the  will,  the  heart;  and 
this  no.Radical  can  admit,  certainly  as  he  explains  it. 

THE   "authority"   OF  CHRISTIANITY. 

What  is  the  kind  and  degree  of  authority  which 
Dr.  Clarke  claims  for  Christianity?  He  says  that  it 
"practically  makes  ,no  difference"  that  "Christians 


21 

assume  Christ  to  be  an  infallible  teacher,  while  other 
masters  are  supposed  to  be  fallible."  He  says  that 
we  go  to  any  teacher  ''for  truth,  not  for  error' ' ;  and, 
if  we  find  what  seems  to  us  false,  we  skip  it,  and  do 
not  venture  to  criticise  it.  **When  we  stop  to  criti- 
cise,'* he  says,  "we  lose  our  teacher,  and  cease  to  be 
disciples.  .  .  .  All  Christians,  in  studying  the  teach- 
ings of  Jesus,  are  in  this  attitude.  They  are  looking 
for  truth,  not  for  falsehood  and  error,"  etc.  And 
this,  he  thinks,  is  the  way  in  which  Kadicals  them- 
selves receive  the  words  of  Socrates,  Plato,  Parker, 
Emerson.  It  surely  needs  little  knowledge  of  Radi- 
cals to  correct  this  misapprehension.  Such  mental 
submissiveness  in  the  spirit  of  faith,  such  reverential 
assumption  of  unmixed  truth,  such  total  absence  of 
critical  discrimination,  is  possible  to  no  one  but  a 
Christian.  Imagination  of  a  peculiarly  vivacious 
kind  is  required  to  attribute  these  Christian  charac- 
teristics to  the  habitual  free-thinker ;  and  any  religion 
which  claims  authority  of  this  sort  is  irreconcilable 
with  the  Eadicalism  that  understands  itself. 

ESSENTIAL  CHRISTIANITY. 

That  Dr.  Clarke  is  far  more  near  to  Orthodoxy  than 
he  seems  to  suspect,  must  occur  to  every  clear- 
thoughted  reader  of  these  explicit  words :  "The  essen- 
tial thing  in  a  religion,  and  the  only  essential  thing, 
is  that  which  was  in  it  in  the  beginning  in  its  source 
and  fountain,  and  which  has  continued  in  it  ever 
since.  .  .  .  The  only  essential  points  which  remain 
[in  Christianity],  which  were  in  the  religion  at  first 
and  have  continued  in  it  ever  since,  are  faith  in  Jesus 
as  the  Christy  the  Son  of  God  ;  and  the  practical  pur- 
pose of  attaining  that  love  to  God  and  love  to  man  of 
which  he  is  the  Mediator. ^^ 

This  tells  us  in  few  words  the  whole  story  of  the 
Syracuse  Conference,  and  explains  fully  Dr.  Clarke's 
speech  and  vote  on  that  occasion.  Here  we  have 
fealty  to  the  Christ,  and  the  attainment  of  love  to  God 
and  man  through  his  mediation,  set  forth  as  the  only 
essentials  of  Christianity ;  but  not  a  word  about  spir- 
itual freedom  or  a  spiritual  Christianity  independent 
of  the  personal  Jesus.  N"ow  these  essentials  are  in- 
deed the  foundation  and  essence  of  Orthodox  Christ- 
ianity, whose  whole  dogmatic  and  ecclesiastical  sys- 
tem is  built  up  out  of  the  logical  sequences  of  which 
these  things  are  merely  the  premises.  The  great 
principles  which  Unitarianism  early  advocated,  and 
which  gave  it  all  its  greatness  as  distinguished  from 


22 


Orthodoxy,  are  completely  thrown  overboard  by  Dr. 
Clarke  in  his  present  statement  of  the  essentials  of 
Christianity ;  they  were  thrown  overboard  by  the  de- 
nomination at  Syracuse;  they  have  been  abandoned 
to  those  who  loved  them  enough  to  follow  their  fort- 
unes in  the  outside  world.  Now,  with  profound  es- 
teem and  admiration  for  Dr.  Clarke,  whose  genial 
character  wins  all  sympathy  and  disarms  all  personal 
criticism,  I  must  not  omit  to  point  out  that  he  him- 
self, in  the  definition  he  now  gives  of  essential  Christ- 
ianity, proves  that  I  am  right  in  identifying  it  sub- 
stantially with  Orthodoxy,  and  in  opposing  it  openly 
as  the  only  way  of  adhering  faithfully  to  thej)er/'ecf 
spiritual  freedom  and  spiritual^  impersonal  religion 
which  collective  Unitarianism,  by  solemn  official 
action,  discarded  forever  at  Syracuse.  To  all  intents 
and  purposes  he  justifies  my  "present  definition"  by 
his  own,  and  justifies  my  anti-Christianity  by  still 
pushing:  aside,  in  the  name  of  Christianity,  the  great 
ideas  which  imperatively  command  me  to  obedience 
in  the  name  of  Free  Keligion. 


THE  lUDEX, 


A  \a/e:e:kly  journal. 

DBVOTED  TO 

FREE    RELIGION. 

PUBLISHED  BY 

THE     INDEX     ASSOCIATION, 

•  AT 

NO.  1  TKEMONT  PI.ACE,  BOSTON. 


Editor:  FRANCIS  ELLINGWOOD  ABBOT. 
Associate  Editor:  ABRAM  WALTER  STEVENS. 

Editorial  Contributors:  O.  B.  Frothingham,  New  York 
City;  W.  J.  Potter,  New  Bedford,  Mass.;  W.  H.  Spencer, 
Sparta,  Wis.;  R.  P.  Hallo  well,  Boston,  Mass. ;  Mrs.  E.  D. 
Cheney,  Jamaica  Plain,  Mass.;  F.  W.  Newman,  England; 
Charles  Voysey,  England;  George  Jacob  Holyoakb, 
li^ngland. 

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Prof.  MAX  MUELLER,  of  Oxford,  England,  in  a  letter  to 
the  Editor  published  in  THE  INDEX  for  January  4, 1873, 
says:  "That  the  want  of  a  journal  entirely  devoted  to 
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